


I’m only gonna say this once

by Paintmeapicture



Series: The Only Way Out [1]
Category: Daredevil (TV), The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Basically I just want to shove Karen into every scene ever, Because I am trash for this trope and this pairing for some reason, F/M, Found Family, Karen is bossy, Medicinal Drug Use, Sharing a Bed, This is what should have happened at the end of the Punisher season one, What else is new, Why do I have so many FEELINGS about them, frank is an idiot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 18:18:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18722389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paintmeapicture/pseuds/Paintmeapicture
Summary: In which Karen picks Frank up from the hospital and Frank is high on painkillers and also an idiot.





	I’m only gonna say this once

She's waiting for him when he leaves the hospital.

He walks out on his own power, wearing a set of scrubs the nurse gave him because his clothes had been beyond saving. He knows he looks like hell. He feels even worse, painkillers doing little to assuage the pain and much to fill his head with fog. Agent Orange did a number on him, and he hadn't taken much of a breather before his showdown with Bill, and he wants to sleep for about three weeks straight.

She's leaning against her car in the drop-off lane, hair shining in the chilly November sunlight. She's wearing blue, as usual, a sweater the color of the sky. For once she's wearing jeans, boots on her feet. He's never seen her dressed like this — she's always been in a pencil skirt and heels, before. Seems he's found Karen Page’s version of casual.

“Hey,” he says, barely managing to force the word out. It's all air and he doesn't think she'll hear, but he should've known better. She looks up, sees him immediately. He can't quite put a name to the look on her face — he'd almost call it relief, except it can't be, can it?

“You waiting for someone?” He asks. Sways a little on his feet. Fuck, he should've called a cab. He'd planned to walk… somewhere. He's too goddamn stubborn for his own good, he knows it.

But she's there, steadying him, putting an arm carefully around his waist. He doesn't mean to, but his arm is around her shoulders before he can stop himself.

“Who do you think I'm waiting for, Frank?” She says quietly, looking at him like he's an idiot. Which he knows he is. There's steel in her voice and her eyes are snapping with blue fire and any thought he had of telling her not to bother with a bum like him flies right out of his head.

“Guess I just don't believe I'm that lucky,” he mumbles, and she smiles. Not much, but he knows her face, sees the signs — the warmth in her eyes, the tiny lift in the corner of her mouth.

“Get in the car,” she says, rolling her eyes.

“Yes, ma'am.” It makes her smile again, a little bigger this time, and he smiles back, a little loopy.

“You high, Castle?”

“Mmmm. Vicodin.”

She snorts at that.

“Do you have a place to stay?”

He thinks about that for a while. “No?”

“So, what, you were just gonna check yourself out of the hospital and then… go pass out on a park bench somewhere? What the hell, Frank?”

“Pete.”

“What?”

“Name's Pete, now.”

“You do not look like a Pete.”

“But I _am_ a Pete,” he argues, with all the inescapable logic of a person hopped up on painkillers. He looks up and realizes they must've been driving for a while now. The hospital is nowhere in sight. He hadn't even realized the car was moving. “Where’re we going?”

“My place, _Pete_.” He hums approvingly at her use of his new name. Old name. He frowns; his old name is Frank, but he's been Pete before, too. It's just legal, now. He'll think about it later.

She parks as close as possible to her building, but they still have to walk a slow, painful half a block to the door. They make it inside, only to be confronted with stairs. A _lot_ of stairs.

“Fuck,” she swears in his ear. She has her arm around him again, supporting him. “Okay, we can take as many breaks as you need.” Her voice is soothing, reassuring, and he hums in agreement even though he has no idea what he's agreeing to.

They make it up two and a half flights before he has to stop. She's breathing hard beside him, and his abs are screaming. She sits him down on the landing, and he leans into the wall. Feels, more than sees, her sit down next to him.

“How'd you know?” He asks. He doesn't elaborate, but he doesn't think he needs to. They've always understood each other.

“I heard about the carousel, put two and two together. Hounded the DHS office, lied and said I was your family, until they told me which hospital the victims were taken to. Paid off an orderly to give me a heads up when you were getting discharged.”

“Y’didn’t have to do all that,” he mutters into his chest.

“Sure, I did. Not like you were gonna call me.”

He shrugs, too stubborn to admit she's right, but he also can't deny it. They don't lie to each other.

“Karen,” he says after a while.

“Frank.”

“You _are_ my family.”

She looks like she might cry, so he leans over and kisses her cheek. _Fuck_ , why is he always making her cry. He can't quite manage to straighten up again, so he rests his head on her shoulder, breathing her in.

They sit there for ten minutes, not talking. When his breathing has returned to normal and he can move without wanting to pass out, he pushes to his feet.

“How much further?”

“We're more than half way.”

“I'm gonna get you an apartment building with an elevator,” he promises in Karen's ear.

“What, a whole building? Don't tease.”

They make it up the last of the stairs, and she props him against the wall beside her door while she fishes in her purse for her keys.

Inside, he zeroes in on the couch with laser focus.

“I don't think so,” she says, dragging him across the apartment. He grunts in protest — it’s all he can manage.

In her bedroom, he balks.

“Get in bed, Frank,” she says, exasperated. He grunts again. “Come on, get in.”

“I can sleep on the couch.”

“You need _rest_ , and you're not going to get it on that couch. It's half your size.”

“No,” he says.

“Castle, get in the goddamn bed.” She sounds like a fucking drill instructor.

He gets in the bed.

“When can you take more meds?” She asks, rifling through the small bag he brought with him from the hospital.

“Haven't taken anything since this morning.”

She reads the bottles, opens a couple to shake pills out. She puts them in his hand, disappears for a moment. Returns with a glass of water.

“Down the hatch,” she says. “Drink the whole glass.”

“You should've been a Marine,” he says, following her orders. She snorts.

“Go to sleep, Frank.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

 

He wakes up in pitch darkness, completely disoriented. He's in a bed. A really comfortable one — so, not in the bunker, then.

There are warm hands wrapped around his bicep, and he knows who they belong to, even in the dark.

He doesn't really remember how he got here. He has a vague memory of sunlight on Karen's hair, of stairs, of the word _family_.

His entire body hurts. He feels like that scene in Indiana Jones, where Marian is trying to kiss Indy and has to demand “where _doesn’t_ it hurt?” and Indy is able to point to about three small spots that she can touch. He carefully pries Karen's hands from around his arm and sits up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He stands up slowly, testing the steadiness of his legs, rolls his shoulders and stretches his arms.

He'll live, it seems. He’s not entirely sure that’s a good thing.

He pads silently around Karen’s apartment, careful not to wake her as he goes to the bathroom or raids her refrigerator for something to eat. He finds some leftover pad Thai and eats it cold, leaning against the counter. It’d probably taste better heated up, but he doesn’t want to use the microwave in case the beep wakes Karen. He chugs a glass of water and takes some more pills, and by the time he’s climbing back into bed he’s exhausted again.

Karen doesn’t wake when the bed shifts from his weight, but she does roll closer to him. Frank wraps his arms around her, presses a kiss to her temple.

He falls asleep with the word _family_ on his lips and her name in his heart.


End file.
